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Up to 700 migrants are feared dead after the boat carrying them capsized in the Mediterranean Sea. Thousands of migrants have lost their lives making the treacherous journey from Africa to Europe in recent years.VPC

A boat transporting migrants arrives in the port of Messina after a rescue operation in the Mediterranean Sea on April 18, 2015.(Photo: Giovanni Isolino, AFP/Getty Images)

Hundreds were feared dead Sunday after a boat carrying up to 700 people capsized north of Libya in what could the deadliest migrant disaster in the Mediterranean Sea.

Only a few dozen people had been rescued in what Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat called the “biggest human tragedy of the last few years.”

Tens of thousands are fleeing war and persecution in North Africa and the Middle East for Europe — and risking drowning while crossing the Mediterranean. The growing humanitarian crisis will likely worsen this spring as the weather improves.

The overnight capsizing prompted European officials and Pope Francis to call for action to stop the deadly tide of migration. Last week, 400 people were presumed drowned when another boat capsized, bringing this year’s total of migrant deaths so far to more than 900, according to the United Nations.

The chaos and violence in Libya have made it an easier port for smugglers to take people across the Mediterranean.

The European Union’s foreign minister, Federica Mogherini, added migration as a last-minute emergency issue to an EU foreign ministers’ meeting on Monday in Luxembourg.

Italian Premier Matteo Renzi summoned his top ministers to a strategy session in Rome Sunday evening. “How can it be that we daily are witnessing a tragedy?” he asked.

Renzi ruled out political calls for a naval blockade off Libya’s coast, saying it would only “wind up helping the smugglers.” He said military ships would rescue any migrants, and it would be impossible to force passengers back to Libya because of the chaos there.

Renzi said Italian authorities are “not in a position to confirm or verify” a survivor’s estimate that 700 people were thrown into the water when the boat capsized in the darkness. By nightfall Sunday, rescuers had found 28 survivors and “alas, 24 dead,” he said.

Pope Francis, speaking earlier in St. Peter’s Square on Sunday, urged leaders to “act decisively and quickly to stop these tragedies from recurring. These are men and women like us, brothers seeking a better life.”

The Italian Coast Guard said the fishing vessel that capsized was carrying 500 to 700 people when the incident happened around midnight local time, the BBC reported.

Muscat put the number of survivors at 50, and International Organization for Migration spokesman Joel Millman said 49 survived, the Associated Press reported.

“Since the waters of the Mediterranean Sea are not too cold at the moment, the authorities hope to find more survivors,” a statement from Millman said.

The Coast Guard said the 66-foot boat was reported to be sinking as the King Jacob, a Portuguese-registered merchant ship, approached to attempt a rescue. The ship recovered 28 people before the vessel overturned.

The Coast Guard said it may have capsized “because its occupants moved to the side closest to the cargo ship,” the AP said.

The incident happened about 120 miles south of the Italian island of Lampedusa, off Libyan waters.

Italian vessels, the Maltese Navy and commercial ships were taking part in the rescue operation.

Personnel at work in the operations room of the Italian Coast Guard in Rome on April 19, 2015, during the coordination of relief efforts after a ship carrying hundreds of migrants capsized off the Libyan coast. (Photo: Angelo Carconi, European Pressphoto Agency)

Italian Border Police Gen. Antonino Iraso told Italian news channel SkyTG24 that wreckage from the migrants’ boat had been seen in the sea.

“They are literally trying to find people alive among the dead floating in the water,” Muscat said.

“A tragedy is unfolding in the Mediterranean and if the EU and the world continue to close their eyes, they will be judged in the harshest terms as it was judged in the past when it closed its eyes to genocides, when the comfortable did nothing,” Muscat said according to the Times of Malta.

In an incident last week, 400 migrants were presumed dead after a double-deck boat capsized Monday about 75 miles south of Lampedusa. On Thursday, 41 migrants were feared drowned in the Mediterranean and, in a separate incident, Italian police arrested 15 Muslim migrants who survivors said tossed 12 Christians from a boat during a recent attempt to cross the sea.

The EU took over Mediterranean patrols after Italy phased out its so-called Mare Nostrum (“Our Sea”) operation in November. Mare Nostrum was launched in 2013 after 360 migrants died off the coast of Lampedusa.

The EU’s Triton mission patrol operates only a few miles off Italy’s coast, while Mare Nostrum patrols took Italian rescue ships up close to Libya’s coast, where most of the smuggling operations originate.

At least 3,500 of the 219,000 refugees and migrants — many fleeing conflicts in Africa, Syria and Iraq — who tried to cross the Mediterranean through irregular routes last year died, UNHCR reported.